SELLERS: Simon Baker and Rebecca Rigg
LOCATION: Sydney, Australia
PRICE: (approx.) $3,500,000
SIZE: (approx.) 1,450 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms
YOUR MAMA’S NOTES: After only about a hot minute on the open market, Australian actor Simon Baker sold his crisply outfitted holiday penthouse above Sydney, Australia’s spectacularly photogenic Bondi Beach for an amount reported Down Under to be above its AUD$3.5 million price tag, an amount our digital currency conversion contraption calculates to roughly US$2.58 million. Handsome Mister Baker, who last year wrapped up a successful seven-season run as the star of “The Mentalist” series, purchased the penthouse in 2014 for AUD$2.63 million (US$1.95 million).
Online marketing materials and other digital resources show the approximately 1,450-square-foot, U-shaped penthouse is a smart and contemporary combination of two smaller units that comprises half of the upper floor of a boutique building set on the precipitous bluff’s edge of the Ben Buckler Headland. There are three on-the-wee-side bedrooms — one of them en suite — and two decidedly minimalist all-white bathrooms lined with Italian marble tiles. Bright white walls stand in stark contrast to the dark stained American oak floorboards that run throughout the penthouse including in the loft-like open plan living/dining/cooking space that stretches more than 33-feet from end to end. In the lounge area, a custom built entertainment unit features a sliding panel that hides or exposes the television and the sparely dressed but most certainly deluxely appointed all-white kitchen has marble counter tops and a long island with integrated three-stool snack counter. There are two single-car garages at the street level and private rooftop terrace has an outdoor kitchen under a trellis structure with retractable canvas awnings along with several dining and lounging areas with knock-your-bikini-off ocean, coastline and Bondi Beach views.
It’s maybe not so much of a surprise the Emmy- and Golden Globe-nominated and People’s Choice Award-winning actor and his long-time wife, Australian actress Rebecca Riggs, would dump their Bondi Beach penthouse since, as was widely reported in the Australian property gossip columns, last year they made a roughly US$4.8 million (AUD$6.5 million) off-market purchase of a three-bedroom contemporary residence in the upscale beachside Sydney suburb of Bronte. The Baker-Riggs are also reported to maintain a country retreat in the Bryon Bay hinterland of Nashua, Australia, that they picked up in 2010 for AUD$1.5 million (US$1.1 million) and our research indicates that in Los Angeles they continue to own a 4,755-square-foot residence on a tree-lined street in a unassumingly swank section of Santa Monica they bought in late 2007 for US$4.65 million (AUD$6.3 million).
Listing photos: McGrath
